ABB India will deliver a 110 kilovolt (kV) digital substation to Technopark, the largest Information Technology (IT) park in India, based on built-up area, located in Kerala and spanning an area of 930,000 square metres. Technopark is envisioned to become a self-contained township with potential to employ a hundred thousand people working in the fields of IT, biotechnology and nanotechnology, increasing the need for reliable power supplies for commercial and residential consumers.

Claudio Facchin, President, ABB, Power Grids division, said, “This will be among the first digital substations in India and supports the country’s vision of smarter grids and cities.

Pitamber Shivnani, President, Power Grids Division, ABB India, said, “India is today a global hub for digital services and transitioning from conventional to the digital power grid is the need of the hour. Digital substations are more dependable and flexible while reducing life-cycle cost and physical footprint.”

Using fibre optic cabling instead of copper enables reduced cost through direct savings on copper, optimised panel design and less civil work to lay cables. Thousands of traditional analogue copper signalling wires between high voltage equipment and the control room are substituted with a few fibre optic digital communication buses (process bus). All this reduces installation cost.